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 expressions from Absalom's lips which made him certain as to how the matter stood.

Verse 34
2Sa 13:34 “And Absalom fled.” This statement follows upon 2Sa 13:29. When the king's sons fled upon their mules, Absalom also took to flight. 2Sa 13:30-33 are a parenthesis, in which the writer describes at once the impression made upon the king and his court by the report of what Absalom had done. The apparently unsuitable position in which this statement is placed may be fully explained from the fact, that the flight of Absalom preceded the arrival of the rest of the sons at the king's palace. The alteration which Böttcher proposes to make in the text, so as to remove this statement altogether on account of its unsuitable position, is proved to be inadmissible by the fact that the account of Absalom's flight cannot possibly be left out, as reference is made to it again afterwards (2Sa 13:37, 2Sa 13:38, “Absalom had fled”). The other alterations proposed by Thenius in the text of 2Sa 13:34, 2Sa 13:37, 2Sa 13:38, are just as arbitrary and out of place, and simply show that this critic was ignorant of the plan adopted by the historian. His plan is the following: To the account of the murder of Amnon, and the consequent flight of the rest of the king's sons whom Absalom had invited to the feast (2Sa 13:29), there is first of all appended a notice of the report which preceded the fugitives and reached the king's ears in an exaggerated form, together with the impression which it made upon the king, and the rectification of that report by Jonadab (2Sa 13:30-33). Then follows the statement that Absalom fled, also the account of the arrival of the king's sons (2Sa 13:34-36). After this we have a statement as to the direction in which Absalom fled, the king's continued mourning, and the length of time that Absalom's banishment lasted (2Sa 13:37, 2Sa 13:38), and finally a remark as to David's feelings towards Absalom (2Sa 13:39). Jonadab's assertion, that Amnon only had been slain, was very speedily confirmed (2Sa 13:34). The young man, the spy, i.e., the young man who was looking out for the return of those who had been invited to the feast, “lifted up his eyes and saw,” i.e., saw as he looked out into the distance, “much people (a crowd of men) coming from the way behind him along the side of the mountain.” אחריו מדּרך, ἐν τῇ ὁδῷ ὄπισθεν αὐτοῦ (lxx), per iter devium (Vulg.), is obscure; and אהר, “behind,” is probably to be understood as meaning “to the west:” from